


Man Of Eternity

by Space_and_Thyme



Category: The Great Gatsby (2013)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-16
Updated: 2018-05-16
Packaged: 2019-05-07 17:43:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14676198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Space_and_Thyme/pseuds/Space_and_Thyme
Summary: It's 1927, two years since Nick Carraway published 'The Great Gatsby', and five years since the death of Jay Gatsby. Needing a change of scenery, Nick has picked up his life, again, and headed for North Carolina. Along the way he meets a woman on a train, who stirs up the ghosts of the past.





	1. The Train

**Author's Note:**

  * For [naturalblues](https://archiveofourown.org/users/naturalblues/gifts).



The cold chill of the early spring breeze provided the perfect metaphor for Nick Carraway. In the days that were meant to be growing warmer, bringing the shining light of the renewed sun with them, Spring had abandoned him.

Oh, nothing so official as to be discarded at the wayside by the vernal equinox, no. The abandonment that Nick Carraway felt with the ever remaining coldness of a prolonged winter, was more or less contained within his breast. You see, it had followed him these last five years - well, four years, six months, and twenty two days to be precise. The other remaining months of that fifth year were days that contained happiness, in some method.

This coldness, the lack of the gleaming sunlight, seemed to follow Nick wherever he travelled.

The snow that had flown during his stay in the Sanatorium was a brilliant example of it, though so where the dull days filled with fog off of the Chicago River. He'd returned to Chicago, you see, once he was released from the institution.

He couldn't bear to stay in New York - not even the state itself - for everything in sight was a reminder of his loss.

New York was not haunted, rather it haunted _him_. Every glitzy street corner bore an echo of a man that was gone; the memory of him seemed to live within the very concrete and steel of the Art Deco city. The city  _breathed_ Jay Gatsby.

So Nick Carraway had left it behind, and with it he had hoped to finally release Gatsby from his thoughts and his heart.

But it wasn't that simple - it was never going to be that simple. He was a haunted man, and the city mattered nothing. Even after authoring and publishing his novel, _The Great Gatsby_ , there was little question about the silence from the empty void at his side. Some days he could feel Gatsby there, sense him in a foreign way. The occasional feeling of being watched, a familiar feeling of the man's unmistakable presence. But it wasn't so; Gatsby was no longer there.

For a man such as Nick, there was no escape. While he thought that time would lessen the blow of Gatsby's senseless death, the reprieve never came. His grief was no longer as violent - he no longer tried to drink himself into an early grave in some unconscious attempt to meet with Gatsby once more - but it was no less passionate than it had been on the day that Jay left this life.

Nick hadn't spoken to Daisy since he tried to call her on the day before Jay's funeral. He wished he could forgive her - she was not the one that pulled the trigger that day, though it was directly tied to her and her decisions. Daisy was a beautiful girl, but a _girl_ was all she was, even now that she was approaching thirty. She was effervescent to be sure, but she wore pseudo-innocence and naivety as a cloak to mask her ineffable shallowness. She cared only for herself, and not for those around her. It had been evident in the end: Jay had given _everything_ for her, and it had led him to his doom.

And now he was laid cold in his grave, and alone again.

Nick wanted to hate his cousin, though as the days ticked by and slipped into the swirling void that became years, he found that he could not hate her. Truly, Nick no longer felt much of anything for Daisy, or, truly, for anyone at all. The last person he truly cared about was Jay's late father - they had remained in contact following Gatsby's funeral. But, he was an old man when his son was born, and the strain of losing his only child had carried him to his own eternal rest within a year of his son.

Nick Carraway hadn't stayed long in Chicago; he found that it too was haunted - marred by memories of Daisy before she and Tom fled to East Egg.

Before Gatsby.

It was always within the strangest of places that Nick felt Gatsby's presence. Melancholy and empty, Nick was no longer startled by it, nor hopeful. Those days had long passed.

But, sitting in a private carriage of a train, gazing despondently out the window towards the grey gloom of the wolflight beyond, waiting for the sun to fully rise, that's when it was the strongest it had been in years.

The ghost of years removed passed by him;  a heady combination of musk,  whisky, champagne, basil, and caramel lingered for just a brief moment as the train passed under the shadow of a deepened storm cloud. A lingering trace of luxury and opulence filtered through a masculine existence.

 And just like that it was gone again; the faintest traces of cologne that bore Jay Gatsby's signature faded once more into the ether.

Nick raised his hands and covered his face; he rubbed firmly at his eyes in a movement of exhaustion - but he was _always_ exhausted now. There seemed to be very little energy left in his blood, even after his institutionalization. He supposed somethings could simply never be recovered.

Perhaps he was deficient on some vitamin or another.

Nick turned back to the window, this time leaning his head against the glass pane as he gazed out at the endless grey landscape of the early April morning.

_'When does the pain finally stop?_  ' he silently wondered to himself. ' _W_ _hen do you stop mourning for the friend that'_ \- he paused. Gatsby had never been his friend - rather he had not been  _just_ his friend. Not in Carraway's heart at least. There was no point in hiding the truth here, not within his own thoughts.

_'When do the days that never came stop haunting you? When does the pain end? The pain of hearing the gunshot that killed the one you love with all your heart? When does their absence cease to feel like the gaping maw of a primal god threatening to consume you whole? When does one finally say goodbye, and move on? Can one move on when there is no closure, neither for the murder, nor the love un-uttered from fear of God - a God by the name of Gatsby? Does it ever stop? Can it ever stop?'_

Nick had nearly fallen asleep, sometime around mid-morning, from the swaying of the train as it jolted along its tracks at a superior speed, when a rap came on the diffused glass door of the private carriage. He snapped back into wakefulness, briefly startling, as he looked up at the door. Through the heavy glass he could just make out the figure of a voluptuous woman in dark clothing. Brows furrowing, Nick smoothed his dark hair back before speaking up carefully.

"Can I help you?"

"Sorry to bother you, sir, but I think you dropped a paper or two out here? You _are_ Mr. N. Carraway, are you not?" She leaned closer into the glass as she spoke. Nick's eyes darted to the pale shape in her hand, and sighed to himself. It was definitely loose paper beyond the ripple glass.

He rubbed at his eyes tiredly once more, before standing to open the door for the woman.

Her hair was dark caramel in colour with a few reddish-golden tresses nearest to her face - likely where the sun reached it the most. Her tresses were long but she wore them in a faux bob over which was pulled a dark Cerulean cloche. Her eyes were steely grey. Her appearance caught Nick off guard; she was more striking than he he expected. Nick had rarely found women to be the thing that drew his eye - Jordan had come close but it had been for the striking and almost predatory aspect of her visage, as though she was a primal spirit masquerading in human form. But this woman, this young woman with the papers in her hands, she was different in one way: she seemed like a variation on the embodiment of Gatsby's ghost. He could see a lingering similarity between this woman and his deceased... friend. But the eyes, oh, the eyes were so different. Where Gatsby's had been blue pools of warmth that pulled him and everyone else in, this woman's were cold and storming: the absence of tenderness by colour alone. Though, the strong dark brows that framed her grey eyes only furthered the familiarity. 

Nick mentally shook the thought away. It was only because he was lingering on thoughts of Gatsby once more. This young woman did not look like Jay - _could_ not. Jay had no family or relations left save for his father, who had himself passed away four years prior, in 1923. Her appearance was coincidental at best, and wishful thinking at worst.

"Mr. Carraway?" Her voice broke the expanse of his silence, and Nick jolted, suddenly wondering how long she had been speaking to him while he started at her, dumbfounded.

"Yes?"

"I said you shouldn't like to drop this - it's your ticket into the Opening of the Roxy!"

His brows furrowed in confusion as he looked down at the paper that the young woman was attempting once more to hand to him. It was a flyer - if it could be called that - for the Grand Opening of the Roxy Theatre, two nights hence.

It was in New York City.

"I'm not going." he shook his head.

"Oh but you _must_! It's going to be such a spectacular party!"

Nick forced himself to smile - he doubted that anything would ever come close to Gatsby's celebrations - not that it mattered any more. "How about you take it and go? I'm not going back to New York."

Her brows furrowed together, and for a moment Nick swore that that he saw Jay in her features. But, as all things, the image passed and did not return. A glimmer of a ghost. He must have been more exhausted than he thought; he had started to see visions of Gatsby - specters in the fog where his mind and reality melded together.

"Oh but I couldn't!"

"Honestly, I insist" He forced another smile, not knowing what else to do.

"If you insist..." The woman's voice faltered slightly as she nodded her dark blonde head to him.

Nick nodded gracefully and waved her off; he wanted rid of her, she who was the ghost in feminine form. A singularly tempting and and yet vile creature. She was a slight upon Gatsby's memory. A demon sent to taunt him as he mourned for his friend, his almost love.

"Good day, Mr. Carraway." she bowed her head once more and turned to leave, but in her words - in the tenor of her voice, Nick caught the ghost once more. It was in the eloquence of her voice, in the flow her words, in the lines of her body.

"Wait!" Nick could not stop himself, a brief rush of panic gripped him and he could not let her go again.

The young woman paused, and turned with her back straight to gaze once more upon the man. Her brows lifted slightly as she looked upon him. "Yes, Mr. Carraway?"

"I..." his mouth ran dry as he realized he had no idea what to say to her. He swallowed tightly around the lump in his throat. "You... You don't happen to... to know someone by the name of Jay Gatsby, do you?"

A look passed over her eyes, but the young woman shook her head gently. "No, sir. Though I read your novel, and it was _quite_ brilliant. Such a terribly sad ending though, it positively broke my heart."

Nick nodded his head, just a little. "You bear a small similarity to him, that's all." He forced himself to smile a brief, sorrow filled, smile as he hazarded a glance up at the woman once more.

She gazed back at him, with a confidence that was foreign to him. After a moment, she spoke. "Mildred Mayfair." she nodded once and bowed her head. "I should be on my way, Mr. Carraway. My father must be wondering where I disappeared off to." She laughed softly.

"Yes, of course. Sorry." Nick nodded and motioned to the door for her.

Miss. Mayfair bowed her head gently, and slipped from the carriage. She disappeared up the hallway, seeking another passenger car, as the train jambled along.

Nick closed the door to the carriage once more, and sighed as he sat down on the bench seat.

Of course it had just been wishful thinking; Jay Gatsby was nothing more than a ghost lingering now in his memories. Of course Mildred had not known him - beyond the man he had written into a novel.

He checked his watch. It was nearly noon.


	2. The Phone

"I say, Old Sport, whatever do _you_ know of grief?"

The voice rang in Nick's mind, his eyes immediately shot open as Gatsby's voice died in his ears.

It was a dream, nothing more. The house he'd rented was empty save for himself. Of course it was.

He couldn't even blame the voices of the dead murmuring in his dreams upon alcohol any more; he'd given it up when he'd been institutionalized. It was the enemy, as much as the Buchanans were. As much as pain and grief were his constant companions.

But perhaps Gatsby - the Gatsby that still lingered in the halls of his memories and was a conjuration of his besotted and broken heart- perhaps that Gatsby was right.

Whatever _did_ Nick know of grief?

He'd mourned the loss of his family when it had come. He'd slowly recovered and adjusted to a world in which his parents were no longer living.

He'd accepted the loss of Daisy, and while it angered him, he felt no great loss once she had stolen away with her husband and daughter to Europe.

Jordan had gone without much fuss. She'd vanished into the wind the moment word had spread that Gatsby - the great Jay Gatsby - was found dead, floating in a spreading cloud of his own blood within his once-used swimming pool.

But other than Gatsby's loss, what had Nick Carraway ever, truly, known for grief?

Was it meant to be the open wound that would not heal?

Was it always the drawn-out pain which knotted in the chest?

The unbidden tears that struck whenever they felt like it? Even in the most inconsequential of times? When nothing triggered them but the sudden gaping maw of pain that threatened to swallow the heart whole?

Was this what grief truly was, or was he yet mistaken?

Perhaps, if he had ever truly known what it meant to be in love... perhaps he might know the answer then.

The gentle embrace of sleep was lost to him now. It was no use to attempt to return to the land of the unconscious - his dreams had taunted him, played on the empty feeling in his heart, and provoked the pain with the  last ringing voice of Jay Gatsby.

Gathering himself together for another sleepless night, Nick padded into his kitchen and set the kettle to boil. Better an early start to the day, than lingering in the dark, in the places that he could not go.

Seating himself once more at his desk, a strong cup of coffee at hand, Nick stared at the waiting typewriter.

The page was blank, perfect in its snow-whiteness. Daunting. Despite the effort and the desire, he had been unable to conjure the words with which to cover the crisp paper - to mar that perfect surface.

He sighed after a moment, his shoulders slumping.

In his heart he knew that he would never again reach the height of wordsmithing that he had with _The Great Gatsby_. It was a story born of the heart and it had brought with it so much truth that the words, once began, poured from him like a river unto the pages.

He had written the story, had breathed life - if only temporarily- back into Jay Gatsby. And when it was concluded, Nick was once more a shell of a writer, unable to bring such life to his words.

Gatsby had been everything - the muse, the guiding spirit, the inspiration, the very reason for the work. He had done it to lay his friend to sleep, to give him the peace which was denied to him in his short life.

Nick's mind wandered, trailing back to the young woman he'd met on the train the week before.

Mildred Mayfair.

He wondered if she attended her hotly awaited opening of the Roxy, or if she'd stayed at home under her father's watchful eye. She'd been travelling with the man, Nick knew that much, despite not seeing the senior Mayfair.

She stayed in his mind, unbidden, when he desired nothing more than to mourn and sink into bitterness. Her familiar shape would not allow it, buoying him back to the surface and demanding that he be a part of the world as it was, rather than living in the one that existed only within his head.

And that's how he knew that she could not be any part of Gatsby - no relation, no spirit born of him. For he had lived so many years in an idea of a future that was never meant to exist.

Mildred Mayfair demanded that the world be experienced exactly as it presented itself, rather than how one wished it to be.

But of course, that Mildred Mayfair existed only within his mind, much in the way that Jay himself still lingered. Rightfully, Nick knew nothing of Mildred, beyond the brief interaction that he had had with her on the train. And, just like that, she was gone once more into the mist, like Gatsby before her.

Nick shook himself free of the thoughts of Mildred. It was no safer to linger there than it was with Gatsby. There was no part of him that desired any part of Mildred. She was a young girl, and she presented a life yet to be lived, a beautiful world of hope. Hope that he'd already forfeit, no matter how he tried to deny it.

Mildred had it all before her, like Gatsby once had. The world just waiting in the palm of her hand.

If he wasn't careful, despite his disgust at the idea of her ever being a shadow of Jay - or even of James Gatz - Nick would build an image of Mildred within his mind, one where she was - in such terms as he had long used to describe Gatsby - the second coming of Jay Gatsby.

But she was a child of eighteen, and she belonged to her own generation, removed from the glimmering gold of the man that once was.

He needed to banish the girl from his thoughts, or else lose his mind to the wondering of _what if?_

Nick scrubbed at his face; there would be time for the _what ifs_ later. A lifetime in all honesty. For now, it was best to leave them be.

Once the gleaming, pink, dawn rose and cast it's effervescent light across the horizon, Nick began to feel the calling of sleep. Pulling at him, it lulled him back to a state of complacency. Perhaps now that the long shadows of the night had passed, he would be permitted to rest without his ghosts hovering close enough to touch, yet so eternally far away.

♦

Nick awoke with a jolt at six o'clock in the evening. Bleary eyed he tried to focus on what it was that pulled him from the empty void of his dreams, and back into reality. Ringing. The shrill, metallic, incessant ringing of a telephone.

Body heavy, exhausted to his very blood, Nick pulled himself upright from his prone position upon the worn old settee in his rented house. He pushed the dark hair back from his eyes as he padded across the distance to the telephone that rang angrily in its cradle - it practically trembled with its currently futile attempt at gaining attention.

"Hello?" Nick's voice was still groggy with sleep, and he was cotton-mouthed. His brows furrowed as he focused his attention on being present in the moment. It would do him no good to be distracted.

"Mr. Carraway?" the voice on the other end was golden syrup - whiskey toned femininity with a flinted edge to its jazzy nature.

His brows knit tightly together, as Nick focused on the voice. He couldn't place it, at least nothing sprang to mind. That voice seemed as though it should stand out in his memory if he had previously encountered it. And yet she obviously knew him - or at least of him in such a way that she was fully able to reach him at his private telephone number.

"Yes?" he hedged carefully. "I'm sorry, who is this?"

A pause on the other end of the phone signaled to the man that the woman had expected to be remembered. Internally he cursed himself. They obviously  _had_ met.

The whiskey voice came again, drifting across the telephone lines from however distant the woman stood. "It's Mildred - Millie - Mayfair."

Ah... And that is why he had not recognized the voice on the other end. For not only had he met her once, a week earlier, but the woman had been soft spoken and polite in those moments - the very embodiment of quiet femininity. The woman now on the phone, well... she was boisterious and spoke comfortably as though she was already intimately familiar with him. It was unnerving, and yet it opened up a line of communication without the trouble of working through layers of conditioning.

"Oh, yes..." he shook his head, unable to believe that he was speaking to the young woman again.

Perhaps she was in his mind so much the morning before for reasons at that time unbeknownst to him. Perhaps his senses had already picked up that this phone call was imminent - how strange a thought that was!!

"I'm sorry, I didn't... I didn't recognize your voice."

"No matter, I suspect that this call is rather unexpect."

_'To say the least of it...'_ he thought to himself, but smiled gently. "It's alright. How can I help you, Miss. Mayfair?"

"Millie." She enunciated once more, saying in few words that he was to call her by her nickname, and nothing less.

"Millie... how can I help you?" he repeated.

"Well, you see Mr. Carraway, I would be _honored_ if you would come to dinner at our house tomorrow evening"

Nick had not been expecting such an invitation. While he didn't know exactly what he _was_ expecting the moment he realized it was the strange young woman from the train that was calling him, he had thought perhaps she had lost something - or perhaps she had found the papers that he had lost somewhere between Chicago and Charlotte.

He felt completely put on the spot, and utterly unwilling to go to dinner with this young girl, no matter how much she might seem like Gatsby.

"Well, Miss - Millie." He quickly corrected himself. "I... I'm flattered, but I've only just met you and-"

"Oh Mr. Carraway, you misunderstand me. And, not to offend you, surely, but this dinner isn't for _me_. It's my father's thirty seventh birthday."

Another pause as Nick attempted to understand her reasoning right now. "I'm afraid I don't understand."

"Well, Mr. Carraway, my father just _loved_ your book. I think it broke his heart - there was such _emotion_ on those pages, Mr. Carraway. Once I realized that you were living in the same city as us, well I thought it was just positively serendipitous!"

Nick sighed internally. He didn't wish to meet this woman's father, though truth be told he had nothing better to do during the allotted evening. "I... suppose so." A thought occurred to him. "Your father is quite young, is he not?"

"Oh, yes Mr. Carraway. He and my mother were _quite_ young when they met and fell in love. This would mean the world to my father, Mr. Carraway. I assure you. My mother passed away a few years ago, and father has done his very best to hold the house together. I cannot think of a better present than inviting the author of a book he so loved to his birthday dinner."

Nick felt trapped, like a lion in too small of a cage - the way he'd seen as a child. "I... well I suppose... yes, alright." giving in, he nodded his head. "What time, tomorrow evening?"

"Why, seven of course!"

He had to laugh, just a little. There was a familiarity in her voice, though he could not place it. Perhaps it was her ineffiable joviality - she seemed to be a force of nature not of this Earth. "Of course! Yes, Millie, give me the address and I'll-"

"Oh, _no_ , Mr. Carraway. That will _not_  do. You see my father is a private man, but one of _impeccable_ taste. I fear that, if your travelling clothes are your Sunday best, as it were, than you are in dire need of a new wardrobe. I'll tell you what, Mr. Carraway. You be ready in the morning, and I'll swing by and I'll take you to my father's personal tailor. How about that?"

The phone nearly fell from Nick's hand as he valiantly tried to understand what was happening. "Oh, Miss. Mayfair - Millie -" he caught himself again. "I couldn't possibly-"

"I _insist_ , Mr. Carraway. Now that I've quite _thoroughly_ accosted you, I'll be letting you be. Good evening, Mr. Carraway. Don't forget, we're going to the tailor's in the morning." There was a confident smile held within her voice.

Nick had to chuckle, if only because for those few minutes her self-assured nature and her positivity was contagious. Without a doubt, the Mayfair girl - no, she was a woman by all measures - was a force of nature.

"Good evening, Millie." he set the phone back into it's cradle.

Perhaps if she was in some small way the second coming of the spirit of Gatsby within the world - rather, within _his_ world, it wasn't entirely so bad. Millie had the same indomitable sense of self, and where he might have found it to be an unattractive trait in any other woman, in Millie he respected it.

While he could never feel the love for Millie that he had for Gatsby, perhaps it wasn't entirely out of the question that he and the young woman could bond in some manner. Afterall, it took charisma to pick up the telephone and just take control of the situation the way that she had.

Nick shook his head, and stood by the window, gazing out on the grounds of his rented home as the first glimmers of the pink and gold dusk began to fall upon the distant hills. For the first time in what seemed to him to be a life time, a smile pulled at his mouth. An honest, contented, smile.

Nick Carraway breathed a sigh of relief, an exhale he had not realized he'd been holding for the last five years, and gave himself up to the world.

Whatever would come, would come.

You can't repeat the past, he'd spoke those words himself, but in the time since Gatsby's senseless death he had not truly listened to his own advice.

Gatsby was free. Only the body, the shell that had housed that wild spirit, was laid in the ground. But, the man himself was free, as he always should have been.

It was time, also, for Nick Carraway to be free.

He resolved to let the pain ease, to mourn properly for the lost potential, for the love he'd been unable to utter to the man. In the end, whatever had passed between them, there had been love of a sort returned from Jay to Nick; it wasn't the love he'd held for Daisy, but Nick had been his closest ally, his confident and friend. There had been love. And if it had never been realized in life, now in death where Gatsby was free and omniscient, he knew.

He knew now that he had been loved without measure and without condition. For the man he was and not for the man he portrayed to the world.

For his strength and his great capacity for hope, and not the wealth that drew all of New York flocking to his doorstep every weekend.

Unconditional love, all that Jay had truly striven for, he knew now that he had it, and always would.

Nick could accept the traces of Gatsby in the people he met here on out. It started with Mildred Mayfair, a woman that not twelve hours passed he had been cursing for bearing even the barest of resemblances to Jay, and yet here he was... all but celebrating the wild spirit of Jay within her.

It was laughable - tantamount to victory in some ways.

Turning away from the window with a smile on his lips, Nick headed down to his kitchen to prepare a simple dinner.

Perhaps later he would be able to finally conjure phrases with which to cover the daunting blank paper. Perhaps Millie was what he had needed, all along.


	3. The Tailor

In the morning a 1921 Dodge Roadster pulled up in front of Nick’s house. It was navy blue with black fenders and a camel-coloured roof. His brows knit as he glanced out the front window at the car. It was small, only large enough to comfortably sit two people. And then he realized as the driver’s door opened.

Mildred Mayfair slid out of the driver's seat, and brushed herself off. While Nick knew that some women drove, he hadn't expected the girl to drive herself here. He'd only assumed that she would have hired a driver for the morning - at the very least called a taxi to take them out.

Not knowing what else to do, Nick stepped out the door and pulled it closed behind him. With a slight metallic pop he heard the lock catch, not that he was overly worried about anyone breaking into his house either way. Despite the success of _The Great Gatsby_ , there was nothing that he possessed that any half-decent thief would wish to take.

"Good morning!" He called out the girl, and held his hand aloft in greeting.

Millie looked up swiftly, and raised her hand in response. "Hello Mr. Carraway! Lovely morning, isn't it?"

It was. Though it was still realitively early Spring, the air was warm and sweet with the promise of new life. The birds sitting in the trees lining the dooryard were singing happily, and the air was fresh and clear.

"It is, yes." Nick nodded his head with a smile as he looked the young woman up and down.

The petrol coloured cloche hat was gone, and her caramel and auburn hair was arranged into tight fingerwaves and scrupulously pinned into a faux bob at the back of her neck. Over this she wore a chocolate-coloured velvet bicorn hat. Her suit was of a similar colour - fine chocolate wool with the barest hint of pink pinstriping.

"You look lovely, Miss. Mayfair."

"Oh Mr. Carraway, _really_! _Don't_ make me tell you again!" She laughed as she turned back to the car. "The name's Millie!" Opening the door, she slid back into the black leather upholstered driver's seat of the Roadster. "Well, come on then Mr. Carrway! Charlotte awaits and I haven't all day!" There was no anger or distress within her whiskey-gold voice, merely a sense of humor that sparkled in her grey eyes as she watched him like a hawk.

Nick sprang to, quickly pulling himself into the remaining seat. He'd barely seated himself when the automobile lurched into action and Millie was turning the loop around the driveway to bring them back to the road. He quickly gripped the seat from habit - not to say that she was a maniac driver, to be told she was quite able. Rather it was from a long embedded habit created by his experiences with Gatsby. The man had been a demon in a yellow Duesenberg. - at least in the manner that he was driven by a ridiculous need for speed and had the tendency to take ridiculous risks with not only his own life, but all those around him, both within his car and outside of it.

Millie simply did not drive in that manner, and Nick exhaled in relief once he realized there was no danger coming from her operation of the Roadster.

Nick persed his lips and relaxed his shoulders, slowly easing himself back upright as he felt Millie's eyes boring into him. She kept her face turned towards the road, yes, but she threw a dark glance his way once or twice.

She didn't mention his uncalled for reaction to her driving.

Swallowing the fear that he'd felt, Nick righted himself. Instead, he turned to the young woman. "You have a lovely car, is it your father's?"

"Hardly, Mr. Carraway. She's mine. Father gave it to me for my twentieth birthday last year."

Nick snorted slightly in surprise. "Twentieth - but I thought your father was turning-"

"Yes Mr. Carraway. My father _is_ turning thirty seven today. I _did_ tell you that he and my mother were very young when I was born. Is there anything else you wish to know?" Millie gripped the varnished wooden steering wheel as she turned the corner in the navy Roadster.

Nick found himself at a loss for words. Yes. There was a lot about he he wished to know, but he didn't know exactly where to start.

He found himself most ineffectually silent now that it mattered.

A moment passed. "What's your father's name?" it was the most basic, polite, conversation that came to mind. After all, it was best to know the name of the man who would hosting him that evening.

"John Gates - Mayfair is my mother's name." she nodded her head before Nick could question the difference in the names of father and daughter. "You see," she nodded her bicorned hatted head to him, "my father did not know that my mother was pregnant - I don't blame him of course, he couldn't have known as my mother didn't reach out to tell him. He left town, and my mother had me and gave me her father's name. Then my father came back when I was still very young. Mother wasn't unhappy with him, mind, and father did feel terrible for leaving her with child."

There was a pause as Millie redirected their course. "But then the war came, and my father went off to serve his country, and he didn't come back immediately. We thought he'd been killed in action, but never knew. Never had any official papers. Turns out he was likely a Prisoner of War - I never asked, and I don't particularly want to know, you understand, Mr. Carraway. Anyway all sordid elements aside, my mother became ill some years ago, and she passed away in the end of '22. My grandparents took me in, and father returned a few weeks later. Swept me away as it were!" she laughed a hearty sound. She seemed to have not a care in the world. 

Nick watched her with awe in his eyes.

"After that my father and I settled here, in Charlotte. We were returning from Chicago when I met you, as father came to collect me after I graduated early from the University of Chicago - father always said a man - or a _woman_ , mind!" she nodded her head again, brusquely. "without an education is no man at all!"

Nick smiled warmly. "Your father is quite the man. Does he know that you're-"

"Taking you to his tailor? Of course not, Mr. Carraway! You need a new suit, we've got the best tailor in town, _and_ you're my surprise for father! Besides, I hear that his new suit has been completed and I'm going to pick it up!"

♦

"Ah! Miss. Mayfair! How good to see you!" the portly gentleman with the white hair and curled mustache greeted them at the door with a smile and open arms.

"Good morning, Mr. Bernard!" Millie shot back quickly as she stepped into the tailor's shop.

"I've got your father's suit all finished, if you'd like to see it." Maurice Bernard motioned her towards the back of the shop. He barely seemed to notice Nick hovering just behind her.

"Yes, of course! But then I need to ask you a _monumental_ favour, Mr. Bernard!" Millie plucked at the fingertips of her gloves, before sliding them from her hands.

Maurice gave her a strange look, but it was not unkind. He nodded his head gently, "Anything for you, Miss. Mayfair."

"Oh, hush!" She laughed softly, and there was the golden-syrup, whiskey-tone once more as she swatted Maurice's beefy forearm with affection.

Smiling warmly, like a grandfather proud of the person his granddaughter had become, Maurice nodded his head before finally spotting Nick. "Oh! Sir I will be with you momentarily!"

"It's quite alright." Nick smiled and waved the two of them off.

"Mr. Carraway is with me, Mr. Bernand." Millie piped happily. "You see, he's in dire need of a new suit."

Behind her, Nick flushed a slight pink tone.

"And I couldn't _possibly_ think of someone better to craft such a fine suit!"

Maurice blushed behind his mustache, patting her hand on his arm with his larger one. "You flatter me, Miss. Mayfair."

"Oh! But no more than you deserve, Mr. Bernard!"

Maurice glanced back at Nick, and studied him. He was a young enough man, but he still was clearly quite a bit older than Millie. Maurice's kind eyes narrowed suspiciously. No one was quite good enough for the lovely Millie Mayfair, as far as he was concerned. Maurice was fond of the girl and her father - their business was always well received, but more importantly, they were simply good people. Having lost his own daughter years before, Maurice rather viewed Millie and her vibrant nature as a surrogate daughter.

"Yes, yes I see..." the tailor turned back to the young woman and smiled gently. "If you're sure, child."

"Well you see, Mr. Bernard, Mr. Carraway here is an author." Her voice was honey sweet.

"An author, you don't say?" he turned back to Nick.

Nick smiled awkwardly, and waved it off. "I've written one book is all."

"Ignore him, he's simply _too modest_ to brag." Millie enunciated her words with a slight shrug of her shoulders and a bobbing shake of her head. A vision of a party girl in professional clothing.

Oh, she was _good. 'She could charm anyone into anything...'_ Nick thought to himself. Perhaps Millie was a dangerous spirit after all.

"I, however, am not!" Millie laughed. "You see Mr. Bernard, Mr. Carraway here is the man that wrote _The Great Gatsby!_ "

Nick looked to her quickly. The way in which she pronounced the name caught him off guard, with the heavy inflection upon the first syllable, extending the sound of the _s_ before the softly spoken _bee_ at the end. It was a familiar pronunciation, common to the method and manner in which the man himself had spoken his moniker. Nick pushed the familiarity aside. As Millie had mentioned, she was a university educated woman, and with such an education came elocution lessons which would have permanently altered her pattern of speech into the "correct" manner of the first class, much the way that James Gatz had taught himself as a child.

"Such a wonderful, heartbreaking, novel. It positively captured me." Millie smiled back at Nick, a glimmer of mischievousness in her eye. He swallowed tightly.

" _The Great Gatsby_ , you say? Well then..." Maurice glanced back at Nick, before returning his gaze to the young woman on his arm.

"It's my father's birthday tonight, and I'm hosting a small dinner party for him - he's much to modest - don't laugh!" she laughed as Maurice gave her an incredulous look. "He may be vibrant with his ties and his accessories, but my father is _much_ too modest to want for a huge party. Not his style, he proclaims. Either way, it's his thirty seventh birthday, and he absolutely _loved The Great Gatsby_! So I thought, _perfect_! I'll bring Mr. Carraway to dinner! But unfortunately the man is slightly moth-eaten and it just won't do, will it, Mr. Carraway?" Millie turned her storming grey eyes back to Nick.

Nick was embarrassed, offended, and completely put on the spot. He forced a smile, and nodded his head firmly. "Unfortunately, no. It will not do."

"Then you require the suit by... good lord, Miss. Mayfair! You need it by tonight?!" Maurice gasped.

"I'm terribly sorry Mr. Bernard, I know it's a great burden to ask of you..."

"Miss. Mayfair, it is already nearing eleven!"

"If it's not possible, I understand, Mr. Bernard. I will not think any less of you if this task is too much."

Maurice was trapped. He sighed softly, and smiled. "Of course not, Miss. Mayfair. But I _will_ need to close the shop to the rest of the public in order to rush this for you."

"That won't be a problem, Mr. Bernard! I'll happily pay for the day's work as well."

Nick stood in shock. He'd been planning on slipping out the moment that the tailor was sure that it could not be rushed. But Millie Mayfair had struck again; she was definitely a force of nature, a wild spirit that people fell at the feet of.

She could have charmed a stone stature into life, if only so that it could lay itself down at her feet.

Nick shook his head a little. Already was there a concept swirling around in his mind. A desire to put pen to paper.

"Well! Now that that's settled, I'd love to see my father's suit!" Millie smiled brightly, and Maurice gasped, jumping back to the original task at hand.

The elder man led the young woman into the back of the shop, as Nick waited out front.

Trailing his eyes over the wall of fabrics and swatches, he tried to clear his mind of everything. This was still such a strange happenstance. The fact that Millie had so easily tracked him down after their brief encounter on the train - and the fact that she was definitely not the quiet young thing he'd met between Chicago and Charlotte - well, it threw him off his game. Yet, despite all the evidence that she should concern him, Nick couldn't help but feel a small amount of affection for Millie growing in his heart. Maybe her boisterous attitude was what he needed to pull him back out of his shell. But he wondered what tonight would bring - he didn't mind meeting fans of his work, but the truth is that the Gatsby novel was so personal, that fielding questions in regards to it often made him uncomfortable. He knew it shouldn't, but it had been his heart's sickness poured upon the pages like a river of woe and sorrow to free him from his grief. It had been both cathartic and further punishment. He only hoped that Millie and her father, John, might understand when he'd had enough of the questioning.

"Oh it's _wonderful_ , Mr. Bernard!" Millie's voice drifted back into the front of the shop as she led the way out of the back, carrying a large box in which was folded the suit that her father had ordered. "Mr. Carraway! Come see the positively beautiful work that Mr. Bernard has done!" she set the parcel on the counter.

Nick shot a self-conscious smile at the tailor, who returned it from behind the great mustache. Both were willing pawns in Millie's game, and they knew it.

Walking to the counter, Nick peered over Millie's shoulder to the folded three-piece suit arranged in the package. It was a fine suiting wool, crafted in a softly metallic grey tone with the barest hint of a pink tint. It was a beautiful suit, to be honest. He told Millie as much.

"They call it Silver Pink - you can see it there in the fine shimmer of the weave!" she lifted the lapel of the jacket and shifted it slightly, until it caught the light and showed its metallic face. "Honestly though, I think it's better described as a tea-stained rose. Oh but it's _so_ lovely! I wouldn't mind a fine suit of the same fabric." She glanced at Maurice, and the tailor took her meaning without question.

"It's lovely, Millie. Your father has fine taste."

"Oh he does, Mr. Carraway." she smiled before putting the top of the box back on top and turned towards Nick. "Now, Mr. Carraway, we must get moving on _your_ suit!"

♦

"Oh, Millie... I'm, I'm not entirely sure about the colour..." Nick had a terrible propensity for being unable to truly deny anyone anything once they'd found their way into his life. It had been almost impossible to deny Jay Gatsby anything, and he was finding that he had the same trouble with Millie Mayfair. She was a much more dominant soul than he.

The colour in question was a vibrant petrol blue, verging more upon teal than the grey-tint which "petrol" usually intoned. Nick doubted that it would suit him, more happily sticking with the common suiting colours of grey, tan, beige, navy, black, or even camel. Petrol was an entirely different end of the spectrum.

"It does suit your eyes, Mr. Carraway." Maurice nodded resolutely as he pinned the mock-up suit pieces in place. The rich petrol blue wool sat as an impeccably folded bundle on the counter five feet away.

"Well... that's lovely, but I-"

"Nonsense, Mr. Carraway!" Millie bubbled as she sat on a tall stool a few feet away.

Nick glanced to where he could see her in the reflection of the mirror.

"It's your _duty_ to be seen!" Millie smiled and nodded her head.

Looking back to his own reflection, where he could see the swatch of petrol blue fabric pinned to his jacket lapel for colour testing, he gave in. Millie would not be moved on the subject, and he couldn't deny that the colour did emphasis the rich Caribbean blue of his eyes. He swallowed tightly. "If you're sure."

"I'm positively _sanguine_ , Mr. Carraway."

♦

For as rushed as the job was, the suit was beautiful. Mr. Bernard had managed to do the impossible, finishing the construction by four in the afternoon. Of course he'd been inspired by an agent of chaos in order to do just that. Millie paid him handsomely for his time and effort.

"Truly, Millie, I can repay you for the suit." Nick tried to argue as he settled into the passenger seat of Millie Mayfair's Roadster.

"Oh, posh!" She huffed as she shifted gears and the vehicle rumbled back onto the roadway. "It was a _gift,_ Mr. Carraway! You owe me nothing but your company tonight." She shot him a winning smile.

Nick brieftly wondered if he was still in the sanatorium, wondering if perhaps Millie Mayfair was a conjuration of his mind. Or, perhaps he was dreaming still.

The drive back to Nick's rented home was quiet, though it was a peaceable silence. Pulling into the driveway, Nick checked his watch.

"It's only four thirty..." his brows furrowed a little. "Would you like a cup of coffee?"

"Wonderful!" Millie parked the car and pulled the handbreak. She followed Nick into his home.

They sat quietly, amiably, over a cup of coffee in Nick's small kitchen. Nick was shy in someways, not knowing quite what to say to the forceful young woman.

But it became a pregnant silence.

"You loved Gatsby, didn't you, Mr. Carraway?" Millie easily took a sip of her rich coffee.

Nick very nearly choked on his coffee, gasping for air as he settled the cup, rattling, into its saucer as Millie watched with a cool disregard for the disruption she had caused. Finally righting himself, Nick turned his attention to the young woman.

She was more perceptive than he would have prefered.

"He was my friend, yes." He nodded his head as he tried to keep his nerves in check.

"Oh, yes, I know that Mr. Carraway. But I meant that you _loved_ him, truly. That he was someone you would have happily spent your life with."

The colour drained from Nick's face, and he could not stop himself from glancing down into the cup of coffee in front of him, unable to meet the woman's eyes. He knew it was wrong to love another man the way that he had, but Gatsby had been _everything._

"I... I don't know what you're talking about." Nick swallowed tightly around the lump forming in his throat, and took a mouthful of his coffee.

"You needn't lie to me, Mr. Carraway. It was _obvious_ in your writing, for those that knew what to look for. You _loved_ Gatsby with all your heart, and he loved _you_ , for that matter." She nodded her head and set her cup aside.

Nick's brows furrowed. "How-"

"It was in your book, Mr. Carraway, whether you realized it or not. In your telling of Gatsby's story, your intricate turn of phrases, the elegant ways in which you described your time with Gatsby - in the flowing prose in which you illuminated the man in a golden glow, it was _inescapable_ , Mr. Carraway. You thought - no, forgive me, you _think_ the world of him. And whether you realize it or not, the way in which Gatsby returned your company, forgive me, but did you not see it?"

Nick watched her for a moment, his mind spinning. "See _what_?"

"Why, Mr. Carraway, that Gatsby loved you _too_."

A weight settled into Nick's belly. A lead thing that nestled down somewhere between his stomach and his small intestine.

_'He loved me too?'_ Nick blinked, trying to accept the words that came from Millie's mouth. His eyes flickered back up to her, and the look that she was giving him, gave him pause.

Millie sat with a serene smile upon her face, but it was not an innocent expression. The angle of the corners of her painted mouth and the knowing look in her grey eyes belied the fact that she knew she had hit the nail on the head. That she had reached too easily into depths of Nick’s heart, and that she had found her prize. The cocksure tilt of her head and the caramel fingerwaves framing her face only added to the haughty-yet-kind, devastating-yet-sweet aura which the young woman radiated like beams from the sun. The lift of her dark brow belied her humor, and her dominance, in the situation.

It sent chills down Nick’s spine.

He shook his head, dismissing the notion that she had won. He wasn't going to let her see how easy it had been for her to work her way in. Couldn't let her see it.

"That's a lovely thought, Miss. Mayfair, but it _is_ just a thought." He nodded his head to her and lifted his coffee to his lips once more.

He did his best to ignore the sweat beading on his forehead.

It had been too easy for Millie.

Oh, but what did it matter now? Gatsby was gone, free to sore and swoop and glimmer in the sky as he was always meant to. But maybe that would be a key to letting some of the pain go - the grief. Perhaps Millie was right. Perhaps Gatsby had loved him in return. He certainly had trusted no one else.


	4. The House

Coffee finished, and redressed in the new petrol blue suit, complete with a gold pocket square which Millie had insisted fit with the colour of jacket, Nick found himself once more in the passenger's seat of Mildred Mayfair's Roadster.

He was quiet, lost in his thoughts as she drove them from his home across town towards her father's house.

The street that Millie and her father lived on was old; the trees lining the edges and the properties were ancient and tall, offering their service as silent sentinels against the inevitable progression of time. As Millie turned into the long driveway of her father’s house, Nick leaned forward, looking up at the green canopy overhead, peering out from behind the camel-coloured roof of the Roadster.

The property was large. A vibrant green lawn shaded by the canopy of multiple ancient oaks whose bases were lined by red cedar mulch. The house itself was a farmhouse in plantation style, with two stories and two enclosed verandas. A red brick chimney stood from the single-story extension on the right side of the house. The roof was shingled with grey slate tiles, and the exterior of the house was painted a rich buttercream colour, with hunter green plantation shutters framing all the many windows.

"It's a lovely house, Millie." Nick breathed softly.

"My father will love to hear you say that." she smiled as she parked the car.

The walkway up to the house was paved with slabs of quartz, rich with rivers of fool's gold and glimmers of pink. They caught the light and reflected it back creating a pathway of sunlight on earth.

Nick followed the young girl to the front door of the farm house. Unlocked, she pushed the doors open and strolled inside with ease.

The interior, revealed to Nick, gave him a moment's pause. The house for all it's grandure outside, was far greater within its halls. The entryway was wide, and the rosewood floors gleamed with fresh polish; he could smell the faint essence of the lemon oil used to treat the hardwood. The walls were painted a warm coral tone, which the white moulding illuminated and offset as the rosewood floors offered a brilliant but soft reddish tone. To the left a massive staircase swept its way up to the second level; the banisters were the same rich rosewood as the flooring and the stairs, while the balustrades holding the banister aloft were painted white. A predominantly pomegranate red Persian carpet lined the centre of the stairs, protecting the floors from the constant footfalls. To the left of the staircase, in the wall between the front door and the stairs, there were placed a set of French doors which, once unlatched, led into the single-storey extension of the house and the veranda on that portion of the building.

To the right of the front door, the house opened up in an expanse, offering both a  reception room meant for entertaining, but which had very little use between social gatherings, complete with Louis XV revival furniture in the same warm coral pink tones with polished wood frames and feet. In the centre was a small card table, arranged for use by the more fashional members of society should they feel the urge to play a hand. Behind the furniture stood a grand piano, the singular darkest element in the room, constructed of ebony wood and ivory keys. Passed this, a three-panelled glass wall consisting of three separate glass doors, opened upon a veranda and revealed the first steps of the magnificent garden beyond house.

The entry way smelled vividly of fresh Spring lilacs, as masses of the flowers from the softest blues and lavenders, to the brightest, crispest, whites filled numerous glass vases arranged to bring beauty and a touch of colour into the otherwise monotone room.

Nick could hardly believe his eyes.

Millie removed the chocolate velvet bicorn hat, followed by her gloves, and set them aside on a small three-legged table that stood just inside the front doors. She glanced at Nick as she looked, open-mouthed, at the magnificence of the house before his eyes. Millie closed the door quietly, before stepping passed Nick as she unbuttoned the jacket of her suit.

"Daddy!" She called out, and her whiskey-gold voice rang through the expansive interior of the farmhouse. "I'm back from town!"

"Ah! Sweetheart!" the modulated and honeyed tone came from the right, passed the entryway and further into currently not visible part of the house.

"I was beginning to worry! You should have called!" There was no trace of anger in the voice of John Gates.

The pronunciation, the enunciation, the very tone of that voice, that strong but warm voice set frost into Nick Carraway's veins. He was rooted to the spot.

The voice of a God - the voice of a _ghost_.

Nick squeezed his eyes shut and forcibly shook his head.

No, no of course not. The man simply possessed the same educated Transatlantic accent caused by elocution lessons sometime during his education. It was all perfectly normal for someone of John Gates' apparent status - at the very least of the modest wealth that he must have been able to accrue over the years, otherwise he'd not have been able to furnish such a lovely house, or give his daughter a Roadster without a second thought, and Millie wouldn't have been able to easily pay off a local tailor for a rushed job, thereby shutting out all the other business for the rest of the day.

Millie turned to Nick with a smile. "Have a seat, Mr. Carraway. I won't be but a moment." She nodded towards the Louis XV furniture in the reception room, near to the grand piano.

Not knowing what else to do with himself, Nick smiled and nodded, before stepping carefully through the expansive entryway. It was so immaculate, so well designed that, despite his well tailored new suit, he felt out of place. He couldn't remember the last time that he- no, that was a lie. The last time that he had felt that out of place had been that first night at Gatsby's. That first utterly ridiculous party to which he'd been personally invited.

Millie smiled at him once more, briefly, as Nick perched himself on the edge of the Louis XV - was it revival? Without any expertise he could not tell, even at this close proximity - two-seated settee.

Millie headed up the staircase, swooping through the entryway and heading up to the second storey landing. John was already waiting up there for her, standing at the landing with his hands lightly braced on the rosewood railing.

"Glad to have you home, sweetheart." John rumbled with good natured tone.

"Happy birthday, Daddy." Millie smiled brightly and engulphed John in a tight hug, which he returned tenfold.

"Thank you, Millie."

"I brought your suit back from Mr. Bernards! Oh and it's lovely, Daddy. The colour is just _perfection_! It'll suit your eyes perfectly!"

John laughed softly at his daughter's excitement. She was always one so full of life - it had made sweeping back into her life so late all the easier. For her, that was, for him it was riddled with the guilt of being gone for so long. But Millie had taken it in stride, even though his reappearance had come on the back of the tragedy of losing her mother.

"I think you should wear it to dinner, tonight."

"To dinner?" John's brows furrowed as he gazed at his daughter.

"Well yes, dinner! It _is_ your birthday!"

"Is that why Mrs. Daniels has been cooking all day? She's not let me into the kitchen or told me what as going on!" John chuckled.

"Exactly! By now you should have known I would be up to _something_!" Millie swatted her father's arm. " _And_ I've brought you a present!"

They were standing just over Nick, but the distance and the height rendered their speaking voices into a dull rumble. He tilted his head back to peer up at them, but he could make out very little of his host from this angle. What he did see, was evidence of Millie's insistence that her father was an impeccable dresser. Independence blue suit trousers with what appeared to be a dove-gray lightweight knit jumper. Beyond that, John Gates was yet a mystery. Nick fiddled with the hem of his petrol blue suit jacket, his fingers tight as the worry once more started to wash over him.

Millie had been entirely too perceptive about the way that he had felt for Jay Gatsby. He could only assume that her father would be similar in nature. He already felt like an animal being put on show - perhaps he should just leave while he could-

"Mr. Carraway!" Millie called from the landing above, forcibly removing him from his thoughts and distracting him from the growing panic that had settled into his belly.

"Uh, yes Miss. Mayfair?" Nick called back up to her.

"Ah good! You're still there!" She laughed as her father looked at her with furrowed brows mixed with a look of confusion.

She knew Nick better than he likd to admit.

"Um, yes? Yes I did promise that I'd be here." Nick projected his voice as best he could.

Millie gave no response, instead turning back to her father. "I brought Mr. Carraway for dinner. The Mr. Nick Carraway!"

"Then I suppose I'd better don my best." John kissed his daughter's forehead.

Millie smiled and closed her eyes briefly during the kiss, before pulling away from John. "Well! I'm going to go dress for dinner. I'll meet you in the dining room shortly!"

when Millie re-emerged and swished her way downstairs, Nick stood immediately in greeting. Her evening dress was gorgeous, the finest mulberry silk velvet, beaded with cut-steel and jet patterns in roving fields of flowers, and overlaid with knee-length skirts of crimson chiffon that floated like perfumed smoke.

"You look lovely." Nick looked her over, and smiled. He really did have a trace of affection for the young girl. She was forceful and indomitable, but charismatic as Hell; a temptress for most, he suspected.

"Why thank you, Mr. Carraway! I always did love red, as you must have guessed!" her laugh was  a silver bell, clear and sound, as she gestured to the sitting room. "Ah, but father does so love red and pink as well, so quite frankly it took _no_ effort to convince him."

"Even so, I rather think you could charm a martyr into sin." He'd said it before he realized it, unable to stop himself. His blue eyes widened in shock, as he moved to apologize.

Millie laughed. "Quite right, Mr. Carraway. You are quite right. Now, come on through to the dining room!"

She left him there, quickly swishing passed him with a flurry of blood-red chiffon. Nick breathed out a long exhale as his shoulders sagged. After a moment, he followed her through the portal arched doorway from the reception room and into the dining room.

The dining room was lavish; the rosewood flooring continued within, and the molding became rosewood wainscoting which hugged and framed the room. The walls were covered in a rich, dark, mint coloured wallpaper which possessed the slightest metallic shimmer. Roses of white, yellow, and pink along with song birds were illustrated upon the paper, in the finest of prints, taken from some Victorian oil painting. The dining room was a stark contrast to the warm coral of the entryway, but no less striking. If anything, it stood as a perfect compliment. At the far end, the same large wall of glass and 3 separate glass doors, just as the sitting room, led to the back veranda and the manicured gardens beyond. These three glass doors were pushed open, allowing for the warm Spring air to lazily drift through, and bring with it the sweet floral notes from the grounds outside. The white chiffon curtains, which hung from a brass rod above the glass wall, flittered and danced with the gentle breeze.  Against the papered wall, visible upon entry, was a heavy mahogany bar, outfitted with several bottles of fine bourbon, brandy, and sherry beside which stood a silver platter bearing crystal bar glasses, standing on their heads. From the ceiling hung a modest, but no less attractive, chandelier. The crystal pieces glimmered in the evening sun, casting a hundred tiny rainbows around the dining room. They chimed a twinkling song as the breeze swayed them.

The dining room table itself was large enough to seat six people, though it seemed as though only two of those places were in constant use. It seemed that John and Millie very rarely entertained, and it was a welcomed change to the crowd that Nick Carraway had once moved within. The china was sparkling white, with a fine gold enamel line along the scalloped edges, and painted with soft white orchids with blue centres, and spiraling green-leafed vines. Three crystal champagne flutes were positioned with the three dinner settings, and Nick's eyes darted off to the side. A silver bucket full of ice and housing a bottle of Dom Pérignon sat upon  a stand to the right of what he assumed to be John's seat at the head of the table. A gramophone stood on a table just inside the door.

Millie motioned for Nick to take the seat across from hers, further inside the room, as she turned to the gramophone. With precision she chose a record and set the needle to it, shifting the brass bell to get the best sound from the machine.

Nick took his seat, still taking in all that had to be seen of the room. Another silence had fallen over them, and he was unsure of how to break it. Instead he chose to half-laugh, looking up at the young woman. "You know, your father has a way of speaking I haven't heard very often."

"Does he?" Millie half turned, glancing over her bare right shoulder back towards him. "And what makes it so strange?"

Nick was put on the spot, and found himself searching desperately for words. He lifted his hand and moved in a way that was half scratching his neck, half adjusting the collar of his white shirt. "Not strange, by any means - and I really only heard the barest of phrases when you were speaking to him earlier." He intoned, desperate to imply that he had not been eavesdropping on father and daughter.

Millie glanced out the arched doorway for the briefest moment, before turning to face the man seated at the table. "Go on, Mr. Carraway. I'm listening." She smiled and perched herslf on the dining room chair, before lifting a crystal glass of water to her darkly painted lips.

Nick swallowed tightly. "Nothing, there's just a... an intonation in his voice." He paused as he thought of the best way to describe what he was thinking. "He possesses the same self-confident tone and cadence as Mr. Gatsby had."

This seemed to pique Millie's interest as her postured straightened slightly, and her dark brow quirked upward. There was the slightest smirk of pride present on her face. "Does he? Oh well now isn't that _funny_!"

The way in which she emphasized it seemed strange, but all through the day Millie had proven herself to be a bearcat, so perhaps the weight in her statement wasn't out of the question. She had a fiery streak, yet he felt as though there was a hint, just a trace, of insult in her voice.

Nick cleared his throat and glanced away.

Millie paused, and sensed the change in the room. "I'm sorry, Mr. Carraway, did I upset you? It's just that when I was reading your book I couldn't help but wonder what Gatsby was like - yes, your descriptions were vivid and appealing, but it was hard to know him. It's also been rather hard to know my father, though I've never desired to press the matter and ask him anything regarding the past. The past is forgotten, after all. Yet I always married the two men together in my mind - I couldn't help but read Gatsby in my father's voice, so you see, it's quite funny to me that that proved to be true."

Nick pushed it aside with a nod, finding it better to move on to another topic. He cleared his throat slightly, "This is a beautiful house, truly." Nick gestured around the spectacular dining room, further expanding his meaning to the rest of the house, though all that he had seen was the reception room included with the entryway and the dynamic dining room. "It's a wonder, such fine interior design." He smiled. "I'd love to see the gardens later, if that would be alright with your father and yourself." he turned to face away from her, looking out the three glass doors upon the pristine grounds.

Millie smiled, warmly this time without the animal glint in her stormy grey eyes. "Oh Mr. Carraway, I have _no doubt_ that you'll be spending _much_ of your free time here." Her smile softened as she felt her father's hand lay itself upon her shoulder, as John stood behind her, framed by the portal arch of the inter-room doorway.

Nick easily turned back towards Millie, and paused as he laid eyes on John.

John was veiled by shadow as he stood behind his daughter. The sun shone from the west, glimmering in from the reception room and the terrace. It grew, creating a golden halo behind the man's silhouette which all but masked him from sight. Time seemed to slow as Nick gazed at the man, whose face was lost within the glowing sun disk behind him as the light shone off of his golden hair. A sparkle flashed off of the band of the wrist watch, as the world moved at a crawl. The sun flared and began to fade into a orange toned pink hue behind John. Nick's heart was pounding in his breast as he stared at the form of the man standing in front of him, hand resting on Millie's shoulder.

He stepped forward from the shadow, standing now beside his daughter, with his hand still laid upon her shoulder.

Finally, John spoke.

"Hello, Old Sport..."


End file.
